Town's big day out fields sunny smiles

A BREAK from the rainy weather of the previous week yielded a window of sunshine for the Winslow Show on Bank Holiday Monday.

And there were plenty of sunny smiles to go with the balmy weather as more than 5,000 people flocked to enjoy themselves at the town's biggest annual event.

Winslow Show celebrated a bumper year, with provisional fundraising figures between 15,000 and 16,000.

The traditional entertainments on offer included show jumping, gymkhana, sheep, hay and grain competions, dog show funfair and a wide variety of fundraising stalls for local charities.

The crafts tent, including a spinning demonstration, proved popular, as did the vintage and classic vehicle display, Winslow Concert Band and the children's Punch and Judy show.

This year's On The Farmthemed fancy dress parade proved very colourful. Winners of the best group fancy dress prize were the Wolf In Sheep's Clothing group, while individual prizewinners were Dylon Standring as a cottonwool-ball sheep and Casper Mainwearing as a farmer complete with cardboard tractor.

Arncott And Winslow Young Farmers proved victorious in the tug of war.

There were a large number of entrants to the show jumping competition, gymkhana and dog shows, making each class highly competitive.

Volunteer chairman of the Winslow Show Association Dean White said: "The variety of family activities make Winslow Show a great day out.

"We're grateful to all our visitors for making the event a huge charity fundraising success.

"We'd particularly like to thank all those volunteers who helped us with the show, inlcuding Winslow Rotary Club, Winslow Lions, the Scouts, Young Farmers and Willen Hospice."

He also thanked the new owner of Winslow Hall, Christopher Gilmour giving permission to hold the show in the hall's grounds.

All money raised will go to charities in Winslow and surrounding villages and final fundraising figures and the charities to benefit from the show will be announced later this year.